CHAP. XXVII. Their corrupting Councils and Fathers, and citing such
CHAP. XXVII. Their corrupting Councils and Fathers, and citing such.
D etect. 18. Another of the Principal Deceits of the Papists, is, the forging and corrupting of Councils and Fathers, and the citation of such forgeries. Be careful therefore how you receive their Allegations, till you have searched and know the Books to be genuine, and the particular words to be there, and uncorrupted.
They have by their greatness obtained the opportunity of possessing so many Libraries, that they might the easilier play this abominable game. But God in mercy hath kept so many monuments of Antiquity out of their hands, partly in the Eastern, and partly in the Reformed Churches, as suffice to discover abundance of their wicked forgeries and falsifications.
Of their forging Canons, yea feigning Councils that never were, (as Council. Sinuessan. Council. Rom. sub Silvestr.) See Bishop Ushers Answer to the Jes. p. 12,13. As also of their forging Constantine's Donation, and Isidore Mercators forging of a fardel of Decretals; and of their falsifying and corrupting in the Doctrine of the Sacrament, the works of Ambrose, of Chrysost. (or the Author operis Imperfecti,) of Fulbertus Bishop of
Chartres; of Rabanus of Mainz, of Bertram, or Ratrannus, &c. Read I pray you the words detecting their horrible impious cheats.
But their Indices expurgatorii will acquaint you with much more. And yet their secreter expurgations are worst of all.
What words of Peters Primacy, and others for their advantage, they have added to Cyprian de unitate Ecclesiae, see in Jer. Stephens his Edition of it, where much more additions to Cyprians works are detected out of many
Oxford Manuscripts.
Andreas Schottus the Jesuit publishing Basils works at Antwerp Lat. A.D.
1616, with Jesuitical fidelity, left out the Epistle, in which is this passage following, which should not be lost: speaking of the Western Bishops he saith [verily the manners of Proud men do use to grow more insolent, if they be honored. And if God be merciful to us, what other addition have we need of? But if God's anger on us remain, what help can the pride of the West bring us? When they neither know the Truth, nor can endure to speak it; but being prepossessed with false suspicions, they do the same things now, which they did in the case of Marcellus, contentiously disputing against those that taught the truth, but for Heresy, confirming it by their authority. Indeed I was willing (not as representing the public person of the East) to write to their Leader (Damasus) but nothing about Church matters, but that I might intimate that they neither knew the truth of the things that are done with us, nor did admit the way by which they might learn them.
And in general, that they should not insult over the calamitous and afflicted, nor think that Pride did make for their dignity, when that one sin alone is enough to make us hateful to God] so far Basil in that Epistle left out by the Jesuit; in which you may see the Roman power in those days, in the consciences of Basil and such other Fathers in the East.
And (by the way) how Tertullian reverenced them, you may see lib. de pudicit. p. 742, where he calls Zepherinus, as we say, all to naught: And the Asian Bishops condemning of Victor, with Irenaeus his reproof of him;
Cyprians and Firmilians condemning Stephen:
Marcellinus his condemnation by all: Liberius his being so oft Anathematized by Hilary
Pictav. the resistance of Zosimus and Boniface by the Africans, &c. show plainly in what esteem the now-infallible universal Head was then among the Fathers, and in all the Churches. But when the Papists come to the mention of such passages, what juggling's do they use? Sometime they silence them: sometime they pass them over in a few words that are buried in a heap of other matters: sometime they bring in some forgeries to obscure them. But commonly they make a nose of wax of Councils and Fathers, as well as of Scripture, and put any ridiculous sense upon them that shall serve their turns, though perhaps six men among them may have five or six
Expositions.
An Epistle of Ciril of Jerusalem to Austin is forged by one, that their Molanus calleth A barbarous impostor (Histor. Imag. l. 3, c. 36.) about the miracles of Jerome; where Purgatory and other errors are befriended. When as Ciril himself died thirty years before Jerome. And yet Binsfield, Suarez and other of the most learned Papists stick not to make use of this forgery for all that.
But it would be tedious to recite their particular forgeries. The studious Reader may find many of them discovered up and down by Bishop Usher and other of our Writers. And for his fuller help, I advise him to read Dr.
Reynolds de Libris Apocryph. and Dr. Th. James his corruptions of the Fathers, and Scultetus his medulla patrum : yea of the Papists themselves, read Sixtus Senensis his Bibliothec. and Bellaerm. de Scriptorib. Eccles.
and Possevines Apparatus, and Erasmus censures on the Fathers which he dealt with: But especially let him not be without Cooks censura Patrum, and Blondell on the Decretals; to which also add Rivets Critica Sacra, and Dallaeus de Pseudepigraphis.
Of their abominable Legends I shall say nothing, but that the wiser sort of themselves are ashamed of them. And if any Ancients have abused the Church by shameless forgeries, the Papists make use of such as confidently as if they were the word of God. For instance, Let any man but read over the Books of Basil Bishop of Seleucia (if it be his indeed) of the life and Miracles of Thecla, and try his faith upon it, whether he be able to believe that Thecla stood so long at the window to hear Paul while all those daily applications and orations were made to her? That Demas and Hermogenes were there to stir up the people against Paul as a deceiver, under the cloak of being his companions; that any of those Orations recited are true, when the Author like a professed fabler useth to say [I suppose thus or thus they said:] that her Mother Theoclaea, and her lover Thamiris were on the sudden so cruel as to burn her, while they are said so much to burn in Love to her; that when Thecla had formed her body like a Cross, and cast herself into the flaming pile, the flames in reverence of the Cross, became as a Chamber to her, covering her like a vault from the people's sight, and not approaching her; and that the earth making a grievous noise, the showers and hail destroyed the people, and Thecla went her way without observance, finding Paul and Onesiphorus hid in a Sepulcher at prayer for her: that Paul permitted her to cut her hair, and change her habit, and become his fellow travailer; that Alexander the Governor was so inflamed with her beauty at Antioch, even before she came in full sight of the people in the City Gate, that he could not forbear, but presently must leap upon her
like a mad dog; that she tore his Cloak, and threw off his Crown, and so saved her Virginity; that for this she was cast and tied to wild beasts, and the Lions couched to her, and one Lyoness fought for her, and killed the rest that assaulted her; that yet they turned more upon her: that she leaped into the Fish pond among the devouring Sea Calvs; and that fire from Heaven came down into the Water, and there made her a chamber, and saved her from those Sea-beasts; that Falconilla's soul appeared to her Mother
Tryphaena to beg Thecla's prayers that she might be admitted into heaven, telling her how much Thecla was admired in Heaven. (She knew who was admired in Heaven before she could be let in:) that at Thecla's prayers she was admitted into heaven; (but tells us not where she was before:) that when Thecla was again tied to wild bulls, and fire set to their posteriors to enrage them, the fire killed them, and burnt the bonds, and she was unhurt.
That Thecla again puts on man's clothes, and seeks Paul; (whether she wore breeches I find not;) that Paul hereupon pronounceth her an Apostle (a predecessor of Pope Joan) and ordaineth her to go and preach the Gospel: and appointeth her to one Pagan City (as if either women were Apostles, or ordained to be preachers of the Gospel, that by Paul were forbidden to speak in the Church: or Apostles were confined to a City:) that she fixed at Seleucia, and there converted and baptized many, and at last (after many miracles) did not die, but entered alive into the earth, which opened itself for her in the place where the holy Table stood; that after her death she wrought those one and thirty miracles that fill a second Book, and many more; appearing to this Basil, and encouraging him when he was weary, to go on in the writing of her praises, and plucking him by the ear, and so curing his headache, which else would have prevented his Oration in her praise the next day, with abundance more that are more strange then this.
I have instanced but in this one case of Thecla, because it would be endless to tell you of all the rest of their fictions (were I acquainted with them all) Nor do I mention this as one of their Legends, no nor as a piece of Metaphrastes, but as the works of St. Basil (not Basil the great) an ancient
Father. Now either this is Basils work, or it is not. If it be not, then you see what trust is to be given to the Papists Antiquities, and supposed Fathers:
For this is one of them, and this story vindicated by Petrus Pantinus, yea by no less a man then the Great Baronius, the Master of Antiquities, who Annal. Tom. 1, ad. An. D. 47, bringeth a whole Army of Fathers to attest the Acts of Thecla, and approveth of this of Basils, and the like of Metaphrastes. Two Testimonies trouble him shrewdly. One is no later than
Tertullian, who (de Baptis. c. 18.) saith thus [But if any women read the pretended writings of Paul, and defend the example of Thecla, for women's
Liberty to teach and baptize, let them know that a Presbyter in Asia, that framed that writing, putting Paul's name instead of his own, was cast out of his place, being convicted of it, and confessing that he did it in love to Paul.] The other is Jerome's testimony de Script. Eccless. who citing the forecited words, saith [The travails therefore of Paul and Thecla, and the whole fable of the baptized Lyon, we reckon among Apocryphal writings: For how can it be that the inseparable companion of the Apostle (Luke) was ignorant of this only among all his matters?] But yet Baronius thinks that these are not the same Books that Tertullian and Jerome speak against: and why so? Because 1. Here is no mention of Theclaes Preaching and Baptizing, nor of the Lyon baptized. 2. Because so many Fathers attest the story. But the first is a visible falsehood, contrary to the express words of the story, which feign Paul to have sent her to preach
as a true Apostle, and mention her baptizing the people of Seleucia. And for the baptized Lyon, perhaps Jerome spoke de baptismate sanguinis: and meant the Lyon that died in the defense of Thecla: And in that place Thecla is brought as calling Death a Baptism: However that word which might easily be mistaken, is no great disproof that this is the same story. And for the Fathers Testimony, as we believe that a famous Martyr called Thecla there was, from whence the occasion of the story rose, so it doth but show how unfit the Fathers are to be the Authors of our Faith, or to be esteemed infallible, that so easily believe and recite the forged stories of an Asiatic
Presbyter, even when Tertullian had before revealed the deceit.
But if really this Book was written by Basil of Seleucia, and was not spurious, then we yet further see, that they that rest upon the Holy
Scriptures alone for the matters of their faith, do take a surer wiser way, then they that build all on the credit of such credulous imprudent fabulous
Fathers as this author was.
By this little taste you may see how their Records and Testimonies from Antiquity are to be trusted: Even as Zosimus report of the Nicene Canon to the African Council was, who proved it a forgery, and so rejected it, when the writings are only in their keeping, and their interest calleth them to deprave them, they are little to be trusted; who dare venture to corrupt those that are in the hands of the Christian world.